Jonathan Fitoussi and Clemens Hourriere – Five Steps

“I recently bought bathroom fixtures for my new home. I chose a faucet that has two separate hot and cold knobs instead of a single knob. The new designs, which have only one handle for both hot and cold, do not seduce me. The salesperson repeatedly referred to my taste as “retro”. The word kept coming up as I continued making choices that were not part of their current best-sellers. Am I really retro? No. I just like mixing “warm” water with two knobs instead of one. When wonderful designs appear and beautiful sounds are made, they become classics no matter how avant garde they are. The Buchla200 synthesiser or “Electric Music Box” is a perfect example. Analog in structure and sound, the Buchla200 is, without question, from the 20th century. 1970 to be exact. The sounds it makes, however, evoke the future. They’re both recognisable and unrecognisable. A future that I hope to see and hear. Warm. Subtle. Analog. This is how I hear these beautiful compositions from Jonathan Fitoussi and Clemens Hourrière. We can hear the artist’s digital experience, but we also hear their desire to go forward using analog’s warmth and subtlety. The result is the future. And it sounds great.” Jesse Hultberg

Five Steps is the fruit of a recent collaboration between Jonathan Fitoussi and Clemens Hourrière. The Buchla 200 is one of the first modular synthesizers dating from the 1970s. Jonathan Fitoussi and Clemens Hourrière, sharing a passion for vintage synthesithers, accepted an invitation at EMS Stockholm for a week-long residency to explore and create this body of work. Using solely the Buchla 200 without any other instruments, the two composers/producers imagines each piece as part of a film track. Using certain sound ideas and talented tinkering, the work is somewhat mimimalist, and offers different moods, corresponding with different times of the day and the city of Stockholm.

Carl Craig opens and closes his new dj set for Mixmag with two tracks from the album (Moonish Landscapes and Aurore boreale respectively).

“Five Steps is a gentle and friendly collection of music created on the Buchla 200, my first choice of all the Buchla instruments. Jonathan Fitoussi and Clemens Hourriere use the 200 with precision and musicality; this speaks both to the composers’ masterful accomplishment and to the enormous flexibility of the Buchla 200. The album is quite even in quality and variety; from sequenced beat patterns to ethereal dreamscapes. My favorite was the textured melodic fragments of Instants Ephemeres.” Morton Subotnick

“… I love hearing the Buchla (…) and especially appreciate the attention you give to spatial placement. I love the precision and intentionality of your compositions, but especially the spirit. Wonderful listening !” Suzanne Ciani

“Superb LP, very impressed by the whole release..” Low Jack

“An elegant and beautifully balanced record. Perfectly in control of the equipment and their material, Fitoussi and Hourriere demonstrate why so many contemporary electronic artists still yearn for the controllability and personality of vintage modular synthesizers. They show that it is not a patina of lo-fi sludge and saturation that is important, it has more to do with the subtle organic control of electronic sound. Control that doesn’t sacrifice serendipity, spontaneity or humanity.” Jim Jupp, Ghost Box Records